SHELBY Nearly 60 string musicians played a rousing bluegrass tune before Gov. Pat McCrory spoke at Saturday’s dedication of the Earl Scruggs Center: Music Stories from the American South.
Rain forced part of the grand opening celebration inside the sanctuary of Central United Methodist Church across from the new $6.5 million center that honors the late Cleveland County native and master of the five-string banjo.
As a standing-room audience clapped, a lineup of musicians that included noted bluegrass mandolin player Sam Bush and members of the Steep Canyon Rangers, a band that tours with actor/banjo player Steve Martin, played the instrumental “Reuben.” It’s the same number a young Scruggs picked when he learned to play the five-string banjo with three fingers.
McCrory told the audience that on the way to Shelby he had cranked up Earl Scruggs music full-blast in the car and that as he stood in the church sanctuary, “I feel like I’m in the Grand Ole Opry.”
Although he prepared a speech, McCrory said, “Earl didn’t like to listen to speeches. I can listen to music – how about you?”
He asked for an encore from the musicians. As they regrouped, McCrory said
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